


There is no dignity in death

by 100demons



Category: Naruto
Genre: F/M, Juvenilia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-12-26
Updated: 2009-12-26
Packaged: 2018-04-20 08:39:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,778
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4780907
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/100demons/pseuds/100demons
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tsunade skirts the faint edge between life and death, and meets a few familiar people.</p>
            </blockquote>





	There is no dignity in death

**Author's Note:**

  * For [NotusLethe](https://archiveofourown.org/users/NotusLethe/gifts).



> I tried to avoid ripping off of Elsewhere as much as possible. Hope it meets expectations!

 

 

anachronism

 

* * *

 

The air was cooler here, and heavier, pressing down on her throat. She had wondered how the locals managed to breathe around here. Perhaps they became used to such conditions, or were genetically suited, she had speculated, when she first arrived. Tsunade leaned heavily against a carton of ration bars, and gripped a kunai reflexively, running faint tendrils of chakra through her fingertips. She no longer wondered about the air; she had long grown used to its presence.

Tsunade squinted and scraped a flaking piece of dried blood off the kunai, unconsciously worrying her lip. She had been here for so long, that nothing was clear anymore. She couldn’t even recall when she had been deployed, what day she had received her order, or where she even was- she knew that she should be troubled, alarmed even, at the prospect of her fogging memory. But she couldn’t quite bring herself to care. She was so tired, and so exhausted. If she could just close her eyes for just a moment, and rest for a while…Tsunade sluggishly fought the urge, and listed all twelve possible ways to heal damage to the retina. The chakra in her hand flickered for a moment, but she let it quickly seep back into her reserves.

She wondered when she had last healed anyone but herself. Months, she guessed hazily. Months since she had felt the cool green chakra illuminate the face of a dying man, months since she had come into contact with someone’s heart and came away with it still beating.

She felt the hum of a smooth presence pop into being, and she quickly scrambled to her feet, letting whatever was left of her chakra pool into her fist. Tsunade cast around her senses automatically, and kept the chakra tightly in check. The presence moved even closer to her, and to her starved senses, it tasted like something dark and musky, and alive. _Just a little more_ , Tsunade thought dully, and she could rest. Complete the mission orders, protect the little rat-hole from this intruder and then she could close her eyes for a long time.

She pulled her fist back and it shot forward landing softly in the palm of an outstretched hand. Tsunade felt an electric shock run up her spine, briefly clearing her mind of the numbing fog. She fought down the fear ( _how the hell did he manage to stop that?_ ), and bared her teeth in a silent fury. Chakra flickered back to life in her hands again- this time, the surge of chakra was much more subtle and refined.

Tsunade felt the presence move, and she strained her eyes just to get a glimpse of the man. Involuntarily, she breathed in deeply and caught a whiff of his scent- he smelled like crushed pine needles, dried coppery blood and... _When he smiled, his tattoo crinkled up, just so, and she found herself with the strange urge to trace it with the tip of her finger. “He’s just like Minato,” he was saying, and Tsunade felt his chest rumble with the sound of his deep voice. A few tears leaked out of her eyes, and she wiped them away slowly with the hand that wasn’t draped around his shoulders. She didn’t know why she even bothered to get drunk if it made her weepy all… “No, no, not the ram-seal, use the ox-seal. See how stable it is now,” she said approvingly, her voice warm. “Yes, Tsunade-sensei,” her student dutifully replied, eyes concentrating on the spluttering fish before her. Tsunade ruffled her student’s pink hair casually, and walked out…_

She stumbled over her feet, head cradled in her chakra-warm hands, whimpering from the pain.

“Ah, shit, shit, _shit_ ,” she heard someone mumble and felt something cool pressed to her forehead. “Damn it, Tsunade what the _hell_ are you doing here?” The stabbing pain in her head soon passed, and Tsunade looked up warily, and fumbled for a kunai.

She heard someone chuckle and she threw the blade at the source of the sound, but was rewarded with nothing but the faint _thump_ of metal hitting earth. “Who are you?” she hissed angrily, letting the fury burn through her pain and exhaustion.

The laughter stopped suddenly as if she had wounded it with her voice. “What do you mean- ah.”

And then, there Jiraiya was. 

Tsunade felt her heart stop beating. “I-impossible. It can’t be- what was your first successful prank on Orochimaru and when was it?”

“Genjutsu on the sleeping roll, triggered to activate with a steady presence of chakra for more than ten minutes, hidden by a small Compression Seal, after we hit Chuunin, on our first mission together,” he answered promptly, and Tsunade sagged forward with relief, letting herself fall into his outstretched hands.

She looked up into his face and traced the tattoo on his cheek, running her fingertip all the way down to his jaw. She froze- hadn’t it run only to his cheekbone the last time she had met him? She ignored Jiraiya’s pallor underneath his tan, and searched his face closely. There were crow’s feet that had crept up into the corner of his eyes, and a few trace scars that skirted the corner of his mouth.

“You’re supposed to be in Grass with Orochimaru,” Tsunade informed him solemnly, her hand trembling. Jiraiya laced his strong, large hand with her wrinkled one, and whispered into her ear, “And you’re supposed to be-“

 

* * *

 

The world dissolved into a million swirling colors, and Tsunade let herself float on the current, smelling the salt of the ocean every time she breathed.

* * *

 

  
mnemosyne

* * *

 

“You’re as lazy as ever, flat-chest,” a voice rumbled above her; _warm_ , she thought, and batted the thought away quickly. She shifted in the warm mess of blankets and refused to open her eyes.

“Wake up,” someone commanded above her, his presence radiating a comforting heat, and instinctively Tsunade cracked an eye open, a snappy retort ready on her lips.

“Better,” the man above her said approvingly, and brushed his hand against her hair, feather-light.

Tsunade stuck her tongue out, and quickly drew it back in, surprised. _Why_ , she wondered for a brief moment, before her thoughts scattered away from her grasp. The man was clothed in a rough, battered armor, and Tsunade struggled to focus on him, and whatever him feel so familiar. Like he was a limb she had lost, and learned to live without, and its sudden return made her feel off-balance, and disoriented.

“Shh,” he soothed. “You don’t have to try so hard. It’ll come back; I promise.”

Tsunade stilled at the sound of his voice, and replayed his voice in her head: the smooth, deep tones; the warmth and steel all wrapped in one; the teasing laughter hidden in a corner, waiting to be let out into the open… She pushed her mind, struggling to place his voice and his face, with its startling tear-drop tattoos-

“Damn it Tsunade, I _told_ you to relax. Well, at least I know it’s really you- you never really did listen to me anyway.” The voice sounded frustrated and angry and melancholy and sad and just a bit scared, and so many other things Tsunade recognized, that it felt like the man was squeezing her heart gently with his warm, calloused hands.She squinted at him, golden-brown eyes narrowing, capturing that little corner of his mouth that curled up, a hidden smile that only she could-

“You smiled like that the first day you came into class,” she blurted out. “And it looked always looked like you had something to laugh about, something you could smile about. You sat right next to Orochimaru, the only boy brave enough to sit next to the genius snake-orphan boy, the only boy brave enough to call the grand-daughter of the Shodai Hokage a flat-chested brat with eyes that were too large, when I called you out on your dirty clothes. You kept tapping your pencil on the desk that my grandfather made with his own hands, and you kept annoying Orochimaru with your stupid, weird questions and your first fight with him was whether or not his book was rattier or yours was. And then-“ Tsunade was stopped by a finger to her mouth, her eyes softening as she recognized the man in front of her.

“Hello Jiraiya.”

Jiraiya smiled back, his eyes brightening noticeably. “I never thought that poor orphan-boy Jiraiya would make such an impact on you Tsunade.” He laughed, tossing his head back, head gleaming in the sunlight.

Tsunade smiled crookedly. But her smile faded as she regarded him, her eyes tightening. “Am I dead? Because if you’re here…” she whispered, and Jiraiya’s cheerful mood faded as well. “Not exactly,” he began hesitantly, picking his words carefully.

“You’re hovering on the line between life and death. You’ve exhausted yourself and your chakra to such a degree that you _should_ be dead, but some parts of your soul refuse to let go of your body. So, your soul slips into these little time pockets here in the afterlife, returning to a time you lived before, so your soul can be stable for a little while. It’s how I found you,” he said quietly, eyes intent on Tsunade’s face.Tsunade closed her eyes and concentrated on the simple motion of breathing, feeling her chest rise and fall. “What’s it like here?” she asked after a little while, eyes still closed.

“Nothing much,” Jiraiya replied comfortably. “Most souls move onto the afterlife, drink a bit of forgetting water and pass through life backwards, de-aging until they become little infants, forgetting a little more of their previous life as time goes on. When they’re practically newborns, they get sent back to earth to be reincarnated and the cycle goes on.”

“What happened to you?” she asked, her voice growing stronger.

Jiraiya hesitated, running a hand through his mane of hair. “I- Pein uh, he uh, sort of killed me and let me drown. The next thing I know, I ended up here taking a bath of green tea, made from the forgetting water. Mi-,” Jiraiya’s voice caught and he coughed uncomfortably, before moving on. “Minato was standing right in front of me, only it wasn’t _really_ him. It was a six year old Minato, and he- he starts telling me that I should never forget about Konoha. And then all the memories the water stole, start coming back. Minato told me what he knew about the world and then wandered off to play with Kushina. And then I found you, and well…” Jiraiya’s voice trailed off, and the silence between them grew oppressive, punctuated only by their soft breaths of air.“Nawaki- and Dan?” Her voice was so frail that Jiraiya’s heart broke.

“You know that they would’ve passed on,” Jiraiya reminded her gently, making a jerking motion with his hand, as if he wanted to touch her hair but then quickly changed his mind about it.

“I’m sorry,” he began, hands twitching as they looked for a kunai to grab onto. Tsunade shook her head in reply, eyes heavy with moisture.

“It’s fine. It’s good- good that they have new lives now. I’ve been mourning them for over thirty years but it still- damn it, it still hurts.” Tsunade blinked rapidly.

A companionable silence settled over the two, and Tsunade managed to sit up from the nest of blankets she had curled into, shedding the dirty armor that still clung to her –from the time bubble, Tsunade recalled. _But it seemed so real_ , she shuddered. Just like the Third World War, all over again.

Armor stripped, and face washed, Tsunade poked at the campfire Jiraiya had set up, face pensive. Jiraiya watched her with keen eyes, as if afraid that she would disappear if he didn’t keep a constant watch on her. Tsunade stifled a laugh and continued prodding the fire, disregarding the pops and sparks that emitted from the fire. _This is all so real; so_ life- _like. But it feels…I haven’t had anything close to this in nearly twenty years…_

“Let’s go find Orochimaru,” she said abruptly. Jiraiya froze, and he slipped the kunai he was polishing back into his holster, knuckles whitening.

“What do you mean, ‘let’s go find Orochimaru’?” he asked slowly.

Tsunade tossed her burnt stick into the fire and turned toward Jiraiya, her face looking young and alive, despite the lack of any genjutsu. _She looks beautiful_ , Jiraiya thought involuntarily, caught by surprise.

"When you saw me here. Really, _really_ saw me. Did you get that sort of ‘right’ feeling. Like- like you found something you thought you had lost a long, long time ago, but you found it, and you didn’t realize-“

“How much you needed it,” Jiraiya completed, his face white, and his hands shaking.

“Yes! Yes!” Tsunade cried exultantly. “Suddenly, everything fits together, and you wonder how you really got along without it!”

“Team Three,” Jiraiya whispered, dark eyes meeting Tsunade’s.

Tsunade jerked away from his intense gaze, her face shadowed. “I’m sorry Jiraiya,” she murmured. “I’m sorry for stopping you from following Orochimaru- I’m sorry that I really didn’t believe you. I’m sorry I didn’t hold onto Orochi harder.”

“Well, I’m not sorry about you saving me from the world’s most dangerous poison in the world. I’m not sorry about you saving my life,” Jiraiya said wryly.

Tsunade grinned and the years fell off her face, wrinkles fading away.

“Okay,” Jiraiya said. “Let’s go find Orochi-chan.” He gave her a mischievous smile, his eyes glittering with excitement.

“I call dibs on frogging his bed,” Jiraiya said impishly, sticking his tongue out at Tsunade who mock-growled at Jiraiya in return, swiping at him playfully. “No way,” she replied, eyes narrowing. “I mentioned it first, _I_ get to play with his hair.”

Jiraiya pretended to give it some thought, finger tapping at his chin, before yielding. ‘Fine,” he grumbled. “But you better go all out,” he threatened.

“Don’t worry,” Tsunade assured him. “I’m sure that I’ll be able to dig up some pink ribbons, some glittery butterfly clips and-“ Tsunade stopped speaking, eyes glazing over for a brief second before returning to their normal amber-brown.

“Are you…?”

Tsunade waved away Jiraiya’s concern and furrowed her brow. “It’s nothing,” she said quickly. “I feel a little lighter now, but other than that, I feel fine. Are you going to quit mothering me?” she snapped at him.

Jiraiya drew back into himself, and his face grew guarded again, wary of another assault. Tsunade sighed, and blew her bangs away from her face impatiently, chewing on the corner of her lip. 

“I’m sorry- I didn’t mean to get bitchy on you. I spent nearly twenty years without you or Orochi…it’ll take a while to get used to,” Tsunade offered quietly.

Jiraiya smiled and his whole face came alive again. He tucked a strand of loose hair behind Tsunade’s ear and whispered teasingly, “We have fifty years to catch up and find Orochimaru.”

Tsunade raised a brow. “Well then, what are we waiting for?”

 

* * *

 

A loud wail rose up in the room, bringing dozens of nurses and guards into the room within moments. A lone medic fought the rush of the crowd, hands already glowing green before they reached the bed. “Everyone, back off,” the medic barked, before pressing her glowing hands onto the still chest.

“Come on,” the medic whispered, pumping the chest with even more chakra, letting the jolts of electricity travel to the heart. “Not _not_ \- please, no, no, _please_.” Sweat poured down the medic’s face, drenching the front of her standard hospital scrubs. “Tsunade-sama, you can’t give up, please- Tsunade-sama!”

The body in the bed arched up in a swift violent motion, and then collapsed back onto the bed. The machines in the room still continued to wail relentlessly, until an annoyed Guard managed to discreetly pull the plug. The medic quickly switched tactics and pressed firm compressions on the spot above the heart, hands pounding on the frail chest, and several nurses flinched when they heard the quick-snap sound of brittle bone breaking. Tears poured down the medic’s cheeks, and her attempts grew more and more brutal as she struggled to pour life back into the empty body.

A guard pulled the medic away from the body, letting her pound her fists onto his porcelain armor, cradling her as if she might break any moment. The medic’s tears fell onto the sterile hospital floor, and her silent sobs were more deafening than the wailing heart-monitor.

“Time of death: Tuesday, the 10th of November, at 16:50, the patient expired.”

 

_le début_

**Author's Note:**

> So, sick and miserable and currently dying of a viral throat infection (which might also be stealth strep, haha, no one fucking knows) gone Wrong, I've spent the past few days alternatively lying in a feverish coma and noodling around on the internet. During the latter bits, I stumbled onto an old Naruto fic I wrote for a Naruto Secret Santa fest hosted on LJ back in 09, still deeply in shock over Jiraiya's death. 
> 
> It's currently the oldest extant transformative work by me I can still find on the internet, the rest thankfully purged/lost/deleted, so I'm posting it up on the Archive for posterity's sake. (Also so I can wince at the oceans of sentimentality, abrupt POV change and flagrant misuse of adjectives by young(er) me.) It dates about three years after I first became fannishly enlightened and about two years after I started writing fic, so it's a little fun to look over it and judge how much I have changed (I'm better with commas now!) and how much I haven't (still fucking obsessed with ninjas). 
> 
> Enjoy!


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